The present disclosure relates to a transmission apparatus, an information processing method, a program, a reception apparatus, and an application-coordinated system and, more particularly, to a transmission apparatus, an information processing method, a program, a reception apparatus, and an application-coordinated system that are configured for the suitable use in the execution of an application program in coordination with the progression of content such as a television program.
For example, suppose the displaying on the screen the information (casts, outlines, previews, and so on) associated with a TV (television) program (hereafter referred to simply as a program) being viewed and the information (news, weather forecast, traffic information, and so on) not directly associated with the program being viewed but helpful for viewers.
In order to realize this, a command for capturing and activating a dedicated application program (hereafter referred to simply as an application) may be transmitted to a TV receiver or the like in coordination with the progression of a program. Actually, in Japan and Europe, this method has been realized by transmitting such a command and such an application by use of the band for data broadcasting in a TV broadcast signal (refer to Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. 2006-50237, for example).
On the other hand, in the U.S., the band for data broadcasting is not arranged in the TV broadcast signal and no method for covering this situation has been established, so that the execution of an application in coordination with the progression of a program has not been realized.
It should be noted that, in the U.S., more households watch programs through CATV (Community Antenna Television) and IPTV (Internet Protocol Television) than the households watching programs by directly receiving TV broadcast signals by TV receivers. With CATV and IPTV, only video and audio signals of a program may be extracted from TV broadcast signals to distribute the extracted video and audio signals, so that, if the band for data broadcasting is arranged in TV broadcast signals in the U.S., there is no assurance that the data broadcast signals including the data associated with an application is transmitted to reception apparatuses.
Further, recently, there are demands for the execution of an application in coordination not only with a program being broadcast but also with a recorded program, a video reproduced from a package media such as DVD (Digital Versatile Disc) or BD (Blu-ray disc), or given content such as a moving picture downloaded from the Internet.